Fish: An Alternative to Bash 

Have you ever wanted to get away from Bash when using Linux? It’s understandable. Though Bash is often praised as being a great shell, it has a lot of shortcomings. Enter Fish shell. It’s a great alternative with tons of neat features. The most notable being predictive type. Other handy features include syntax highlighting, searchable command history and auto suggestions.

Installation

Fish is available in the software repository of most Linux distro. Use the following command to install Fish.

Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install fish

Arch Linux

sudo pacman -S fish

OpenSUSE

sudo zypper install fish

Fedora

sudo yum install fish

Find it on GitHub
Can’t find it for your distro? Looks like you might have to build it yourself. Visit the Fish shell GitHub page. They’ve got some detailed instructions on how to build it.

Replacing Bash With Fish

Replacing Bash with Fish is as simple as a single command. Open your terminal of choice and execute the following command.

chsh -s /usr/bin/fish

Once this command has been entered, you’ll be asked to enter your password. Input it and Fish shell will take the place of Bash as your default.

Now that Fish is the default, it’s time to switch to it. Yes, you could just close your terminal window and then re-open it. It’s a lot faster to just type the command below and immediately switch to it.

Fish

As stated above, Fish is very user friendly. Just start typing. It’ll guess. Want to type in the pacman command? Chances are it’ll fill it out for you. All you’ve got to do is hit the right arrow on your keyboard and let it auto-complete. This feature is very powerful. It doesn’t just work with system commands (like packagers) but with any command or terminal program available. If it’s installed on your system in some way, Fish will find it and let you know about it.

Configuration

Fish really doesn’t need that much configuration. From the start everything should be set up exactly the way you need. There is, however, one small tweak that can make your Fish experience that much better: Disabling the startup message. Though helpful, it can get pretty annoying to see every single time you open a new terminal window.

Welcome to fish, the friendly interactive shell   Type help for instructions on how to use fish

To disable, start by making the Fish shell configuration directory.

mkdir -p ~/.config/fish

After making the directory, it’s time to make the configuration file.

nano ~/.config/fish/config.fish

Paste the code below into the nano window and press “Ctrl + o” to save. When saved, the greeting will never show up while opening a new terminal window.

set fish_greeting ""

More Configuration

Along with the configure file, it’s also possible to configure Fish with its web interface. Simply open a terminal and enter the command below to be taken to it.

fish_config

The web interface allows for many, many customization options. Too many to list here!

Conclusion

While Bash is a good shell, Fish is better. It makes up for a lot of the shortcomings Bash and other shells have. The auto-complete function is a lifesaver, and the robust configuration options are a welcome addition. The shell is very fast and light on it’s feet. Sure, there are other alternatives, and maybe even some that boast equivalent features, but where Fish wins is its simplicity. It’s easy to set up, easy to configure and easy to get stuff done.